Their hero is Subramanian Swamy – originator of the term Virat Bhondu, who likes to poke his nose in and take credit for anything and everything right from 2G scam expose, Italian Marines’s return to India or NASA’s moon landings!

Nathuram Godse is a martyr

Absolutely hate Congress and MK Gandhi and Nehru-Gandhi family

Want India to be like Israel while dealing with Pakistan

Vedas is epitome of knowledge notwithstanding the fact that it won’t even help you make a stone age tool

Astrology is science!

Cow is their favourite animal and cow urine is their preferred drink, aftershave, fuel, shampoo, toilet cleaner and more. They love cow so much that if you open their skulls all you will find is cow dung!

Clarification: This post is not pro Congress or anti-BJP. I am not a fan of any political party nor do I hate any one in particular. This is just a collection of common traits of right wing bhondu nationalists.

Another day, another rape in the Indian capital. This time a five year old girl. Rapes are daily phenomena in India. Even after the great outrage over the gang rape few months back. It goes on. Why?

The number one reason of rapes is the male supremacist attitude of the society. Right from the birth we teach our sons and daughters one single thing – girls are weak, boys are stronger. Girls should be protected and boys should be the ones to protect them. This differentiation starts from the very young age itself. Girls get delicate dolls to play with. Boys get supposedly macho and manly toys like guns and cars and action figures. It is as if we train the boys to be fighters and girls to be mothers and care takers and home makers.

Look at you, look in your home, look around you. You will see silent discrimination against women. They do not have as much freedom as boys do. Come home by this time, don’t go out alone, don’t make friends with boys, don’t do this, don’t do that! All restrictions on girls. Yes there are restrictions on boys as well but not as much as on girls. Why? Oh for their own safety! The world is a bad place you know, so girls should take extra care!

Why?

Because we teach our boys that they are superiors to girls!

That’s the only reason why some men rape. They look at women as lowly creatures. Someone who should obey every single command of a man! Cook for the man, feed him, wash his clothes, take care of him, have sex with him. Do whatever the man asks! Why? Because he is the man damn it!

Men and their world!

It’s a men’s world. Women should carry their father’s name and later the husband’s. Move in to husband’s house after marriage. Property – owned by men. Jobs – owned by men. Money – owned by men. Men. Men. Men! It’s their world and women are only here for their consumption!

Every single institution made by men is fundamentally against women. Religion – in every flavour – is the oldest and most potent weapon of suppression. And it goes on year after year, decade after decade, century after century in the name of culture and tradition!

And then to compensate we allocate women a few festivals. Some god spots, some reserved seats in buses and trains.

This is a fucked up situation.

Unless and until we teach our boys to treat the other sex as equal, rapes will not stop. Unless we ourselves don’t treat our sons and daughters equally, rapes will not stop. Unless we don’t recognize women as humans, rapes will not stop.

So many times I hear this argument – the motto of which is – others are doing even worse things so this is justifiable.

Example – 2002 anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat by RSS/BJP
Retort – Congress did the same to Sikhs in 1984!

So Congress killed the sikhs in 1984 so it is ok for RSS/BJP to kill Muslims in 2002? What Congress did in 1984 was despicable. Do we have to follow it?

Forcing people in Bombay Mumbai to write the names of the shops in Marathi
Retort – go to south, you will find all names in their languages.

People down south don’t understand any language other than their own. So they HAVE to write shop names in the most common language. Mumbai being a cosmopolitan city, the most common language is English really! Even Maraharashtrians are sending their kids to English schools, vernacular medium schools are ding a slow death – all of them!

Fear of Mumbai bundh over Bal Thackeray’s death
Retort – When MGR died they burned busses and entire state was closed for a week! A one day bundh is nothing!

Huh! So we have to follow the antics of the lunatics? Committing suicide upon a political leader’s death is also very common down south. Why don’t you follow that example as well?
And we should be thankful that you forced us to shut down only for a day where you could have done it for a week?

Other examples are – why Mumbai riots? Because some Hindus were killed in Dongri. Why Gujarat riots? Because a train coach full of Hindus was burnt at Godhra. Why kill Muslims? Because Hindus are being killed in Pakistan, Kashmir. Why rename Mumbai to Bombay? Because South Indians name their cities in their language.

I agree with the girl. It is outrageous to bring a city to standstill over a man’s death. And it’s even more outrageous to say it was because people respected him! People feared him. People feared Bal Thackeray and the goons of Shiv Sena. Who knows whose shop/house/car might be the next to be burnt down by the mindless mob of Shiv Sainiks.

Finally fell to the dark side and bought an iPad. I wanted to get a tablet for some time and I always wanted a 10 inch one because I primarily wanted it for web browsing. iPad was a clear winner, various Android ones didn’t really cut it and I already have an Android phone so didn’t want Android on tablet again. Microsoft Surface is due in October and don’t know how long it would take to arrive in India.

iPad 2 16 GB Wifi only in India is for 24500 and iPad 3 16 GB Wifi only is 30500. I remember seeing an offer on eBay some months ago for ipad 2 for around 20,000. So I figured I can get ipad 2 for around the same price somewhere on the Internet. Now that we have so many VC backed ecommerce companies I was sure someone will be selling it with a huge discount under some deal. So I began deal hunting.

Started with sites like MySmartPrice, Junglee, Naaptol and PriceDekho. Found Univercell.in selling iPad 3 for 28195. That was the best price, I decided to place an order next day and when I went back it was 29370! Then I got a mail from Indiatimes Shopping with a 10% discount coupon on computer products. That would have given me a discount of 3050 and I would have got my iPad for 27450. I almost bought it, but cancelled at the last payment step because it was black iPad. I was more interested in a white one. White iPad 3 was out of stock on Indiatimes shopping.

Hunt continued and I landed on Homeshop18. They had a discount code of 2000 and also had white in stock. So I could have got it for 28500. I had two options – get iPad 3 black for 27450 or iPad white for 28500. Searching for coupon codes for Homeshop18 I found DesiDime.com. It has an amazing forum where people come and share coupon codes and deals for various ecommerce sites in India. I found a thread about super deals on homeshop18. It had iPad as one of deal items. The deal would come alive on July 22. Now the catch was that it wasn’t sure what kind of discount it would have. The Indiatimes discount was ending on 21st and Homeshop18 deal was becoming available on 00:01 on 22 July. If it would have a lesser discount then I would miss the Indiatimes deal.

So I waited for 12’o clock. I opened Indiatimes shopping in a one tab a couple minutes before 12, availed of the discount and waited on the payment page. As soon as the date changed I checked the super deals page on Homeshop18 in another tab and found a coupon code, used it and got a discount of 4901! Making the net price 25599! Went ahead and completed the order. Turns out Homeshop18 has such amazing deals every week!

India wants Kashmir, Pakistan wants Kashmir, Kashmiris want an independent nation. What should be done? Logic says whatever the people of the land want should happen – if they want an independent nation, lets give it to them. But is that feasible?

India wants Kashmir to salvage the national pride that the jingoistic politicos have fed the nation for past 50 years – “दूध मांगोगे तो खीर देंगे, कश्मीर मांगोगे तो चीर देंगे!” (If you ask for milk, we’ll give you kheer, if you ask for Kashmir we’ll tear you apart!)
There’s also a real danger in letting Kashmir become a separate nation. It will set a precedence. I will come to that in a while.

Pakistan wants Kashmir for the same jingoistic reasons but at the same time it doesn’t actually want Kashmir. Pakistani Army is the most important entity in Pakistan. They are everywhere and they own and operate virtually the entire nation. Pak army has been able to maintain its grip and its size by scare mongering based on an imminent attack from India over the Kashmir issue. Tomorrow if the Kashmir no longer remains a conflict between the two nations, Pakistani army will lose the alibi to maintain its clout and to continue to hog the national resources it is hogging today. So whether the Pak army will really allow a solution of the Kashmir issue is another matter.

Back to India. Letting Kashmir become an independent nation will set a precedence. If a set of people don’t want to be with the Union of India anymore, they know all they need to do is follow the Kashmir model and get your “independence” in a few years. Gujarat will say we want a separate nation, then Maharashtra will say the same then Andhra, then Assam, then Punjab. I am not saying it will happen. But if it does happen the Indian state will have to let them go. India may disintegrate.

There are two sides of this argument.

What’s wrong if a nation disintegrates? USSR disintegrated, today all of those nations are better off. We are seeing in India, carving out smaller states from larger ones actually improves administration and economy of both the old and new states. And lets say even if in future India is just left with say 5 states what harm will it do? Europe is a country of smaller nations and all of them are prospering (Irrespective of the current economic scenario). In fact bringing them all together like a single nation under the banner of Euro is doing more harm to them than good where better off economies like Germany are forced to feed weaker economies like Greece. So in a sense letting go a smaller part of the country is not such a bad idea.

Letting go of Kashmir is not such a bad idea considering the amount of resources and lives we are wasting there. What for? For a piece of land where the majority people don’t want to be with us?

But then there’s example of American civil war. Half the nation wanted out of the union but the northern states kept them in the union by force. It all ended well and today US is a strong country despite its size.

So what should India do? I am of the opinion that Jammu and Ladakh should be separated from Kashmir and integrated with India and Kashmiris should be allowed to decide their own fate. Why take out Jammu and Ladakh? Because apparently only the Kashmir valley has problem with India.

The bigger question is will making Kashmir an independent nation buy peace for India? Pakistan and Pakistani Army will claim a victory for they will achieve their goal of “liberating” Kashmir from the clutches of India. But what after that? Will ISI sponsored terrorism against India stop? Probably not. So what is the solution?

Choosing a DTH provider in India is tougher than choosing a spouse. I have had a Full HD 32″ LCD TV for a year but I was still running on the old cable connection. Finally I thought it’s time to move on. Main lure was the presence of HD channels. Lots of channels are now available in High Definition and I also wanted a DVR to be able to record shows and pause live TV. So I began hunting for a DTH service.

First I asked my cable guy if they have a Set top box. They do have but it’s not HD and no DVR so it was out of contention. Hathway Cable has started HD services but they are not available in my locality. (Cable guys have divided areas amongst themselves to avoid competition)

Dish and TataSky are oldest in India. Airtel, Reliance, Videocon and Sun are new and boast of MPEG-4 compression which seemingly has better quality over MPEG-2 of the older players. So At first I decided to only look at the four new players.

Sun is strong in south but their HD offerings were least exciting. Their web site is also enough to put someone off instantly. So that was out immediately.

Reliance is boasting of providing 250 HD channels but all of them are upscaled. The real HD channels are only 6 whereas Airtel and Videocon have 10 and 11 respectively. So the choice was quickly narrowed down to Airtel and Videocon.

I was more interested in English movies and infotainment channels like Discovery and Nat Geo. Videocon had more HD channels that mattered to me. Airtel didn’t have ESPN, Star Cricket and Travel XP in HD instead they had UTV stars and History TV. Videocon didn’t have History TV in HD but had the other three. The main lure was Travel XP, because I had seen that one at a hotel and instantly liked it. Only Videocon and Dish TV carry Travel XP at the moment. Videocon had the best price. Their highest package (Platinum+HD) included all their channels and HD for Rs. 441 per month and even less if I prepaid for entire year. The same thing was costing Rs.486 at Airtel where HD had to be bought separately and all HD channels were not part of that bouquet. Videocon only had a 160 GB hard disk in the DVR against 320 GB of Airtel but I thought I could live with that.

Meanwhile I also checked out TataSky and Dish TV. Dish didn’t really have too much to offer in HD department and they didn’t have a HD DVR either (at least I couldn’t find one on their site) besides Dish’s highest plan was at 550 something so I put a cross mark against it. Then I looked at TataSky. They had 8 HD channels. The 3 missing ones were Colors, Movies Now and Travel XP. Missing Movies Now HD was a huge minus for me. TataSky was the first to introduce DVR in India and they have the largest capacity disk on DVR – 500 GB which can record 700 hours of SD programming. That was huge and they had a super annual package that included all of the channels including HD for one year and a fixed price for the entire year. Any new channels added in the next year will be part of this package as well. That was a huge advantage, but videocon was still cheaper and had two HD channels that I cared about – MoviesNow and TravelXP.

So I decided to go with Videocon. I went online to purchase and boom! The HD DVR was no longer available! I called the customer support to enquire for the same, the guy put me hold for 10 minutes and the call dropped. That kind of put me off. Next day I got a call from them and I was told the HD DVR is now available only in Mumbai so they have taken it off website and are selling it only in cash. I didn’t like it. I weighed different options again and once again came to the conclusion that Videocon was best. So I was ready to buy it. Then I decided to check out their Facebook account. And over there I read a comment from someone about History TV not being available! I knew History was not available in HD but not at all?? What the hell!!

History channel was recently relaunched and rebranded as History TV 18 and had some kick ass shows like Ice Road Truckers and was an absolute must! Even my cable guy provided it! Now this was too much. Videocon didn’t have a great website, DVR was not available online, customer support didn’t really look that good and the DVR had only 160 GB storage. Videocon was cancelled and I went back to drawing board. Now the choice was between Airtel and TataSky. I had called TataSky and confirmed, they too had switched to MPEG-4. Airtel had better HD package but was expensive, TataSky had a larger capacity disk and on the online forums I read they had been adding new HD channels regularly over last couple of months. Two months back they didn’t even have these many HD channels. They are slow in adding channels but they do add. And with the Mega Lite pack that I was considering I would get them all at no extra cost. TataSky also has a service called Video On Demand where I can connect the box to Internet and I can download videos, even movies and shows from the past 5 days and I would have ample space to store all the content. At this point I think its a unique feature provided only by TataSky.

So TataSky it was. TataSky+ HD to be specific. I paid Rs. 10,200 for which I got HD DVR with 500 GB hard disk, full year subscription for the Mega Lite pack which included all channels carried by TataSky including HD, 12 showcase movies and 1 year subscription to BusinessWorld magazine. And under a special offer I got 500 Rs. credit in my account. Paid it yesterday, and it was installed at my home today morning.

And I am loving it already! The HD clarity is awesome! Finally my HD TV is doing what it was supposed to do! The DVR is perfect, I have already set it up to record a couple of movies that will be telecast today. They have an app for Android phones where by I can give instructions to record any program from anywhere. In fact I set up one of the movies to be recorded from my mobile. Videocon and Airtel have such programs too but TataSky’s app is most polished and slick amongst all.

I am happy with my decision. Having a couple more HD channels would have been great but I am sure they will be added soon.

So you are a programmer, work whole day in front of a computer, do your shopping online, pay your bills online and file your IT return online and so you thought you will also be able to renew your passport online? Ha ha ha come back to the real world dumbass!

You think you are very smart and you will be able to save some time and not have to stand in a queue by filling a passport application form online? No you idiot!There’s no escaping the queues. It doesn’t matter if we let you fill a form online and give you a date and time to come and submit your papers. It doesn’t matter whether we write on our website that you can submit your application anywhere – a regional passport office or a passport application collection center. You have to somehow magically figure it out that we accept it only at our regional passport office and boo ya if you ended up visiting your nearest collection center and wasting your appointment and time.

You see you IT type people really think you can do everything online and electronically like they do in the west and think you will be able to save your precious time. Huh! NO my boy! This is India and we are public servants – heck we are public’s masters, YOU are our servants. We will make you feel as miserable as we can before we will do anything for you get that?

So if you wanna file your damn application at this center come at 7 in the morning, stand in a queue for a couple of hours, at 9 we will give out only 50 tokens and then entertain only those lucky few. If you aren’t one of them, screw you. Get lost and come back tomorrow.

Whatever is written on this URL about online application procedure is bullshit. Come on dude, you are 30 and you have been living in this country for as long, you gotta see this coming. Don’t be so naive!

Listen we really don’t give a fuck about the value of your time. Man, value of time? Where did you hear that term? At some comedy show? See we are stuck here in this mundane job and we will be doing this for the rest of our life so don’t bother us with all those rosy notions of yours. The rules are written on the notice board, read them and fuck off.

That’s my experience with trying to file my passport application online. I had gotten my passport when I was 15. Now I want to change my photo, address and signature on my passport. I landed up on India Passport’s website and was delighted to know the procedure can be done online.

I filled up the form, I got a date and time to visit a passport office and submit my papers. I collected all papers and today on my appointed date and time visited the nearest passport application collection center at Kandivali. There I was told it is accepted at Worli not there. If I want to submit it there I have to come at 9 and get a token. That’s it. No arguments. We don’t know what is written on the site. Read the notice board and come later. Some other people told me the queue for tokens begins to form at 7 and they give only 50 tokens.

So much for online procedure!

We in India are moving procedures online and making everything “e” only for the sake of it. E-Governance is a hogwash. Pure bullshit! You want to file IT return online? File the return, download a file and send it by post to Bangalore. When was the last time you sent something by post? I don’t even know where the nearest letterbox is. You don’t want to send it by post then sign it digitally. How do you sign it digitally? You need a digital signature. How to get a digital signature? That’s an offline procedure.

You want to get a marriage certificate? Visit the local municipal office, stand in a queue for a couple of hours, they give you a date after one month. Visit on that date, stand in the queue again for a couple of hours and then they do your procedure and you are told to come again after 15 days to collect your certificate. And when you go to collect the certificate once again stand in a queue, give some chai pani (bribe) and get your certificate! The story is same if you want a ration card, a shop and establishment license, an import export code or anything! Queues, queues and more queues.

Heck even at private establishments the things aren’t ahy better. I needed my signature verification done from my bank which unfortunately is Axis Bank. I visited them last Saturday for the purpose. I was asked to come on Monday. I went on Tuesday morning, I was told the system is down please come at 3. I went back at 3, the lady whom I was interacting with had gone for lunch. I waited 20 minutes and finally got my letter. Axis Bank does not have a set lunch time for the staff so they have to squeeze it in between the working hours. And customers have to wait.

So literally nobody in India gives a fuck about others’ time. Really we Indians just do not value time. We have accepted queues as part of life. Train tickets, movie tickets, bus stand, auto stand, air port security check, store checkout counters, places of worship….queues are everywhere. Heck I have even seen a queue outside jewellery shops! Indians stand in a queue even to buy gold! Even processes that seem online have an offline component. If you buy movie ticket online, you still have to get the actual ticket that will allow you entry in the hall from the ticket counter for which you have to stand in the queue.

I am part of Mumbai Freethinkers, Mumbai chapter of Nirmukta an organisation that promotes scientific thinking and rationality in India. We had organised an eye donation camp on Sunday 16 October and Dr. Mayur Morekar, a fellow freethinker gave an awesome presentation about the benefits of eye donation and gave some useful tips for protecting our eyes.

Key points of the talk:

A. Eye Donation.

1. Individuals of any age can donate the eyes. The donor may be a just born neonate or a 100 year old adult. Anyone, even people who have undergone cataract surgery, LASIK surgery, spectacle wearers, and diabetics can also pledge to donate their eyes.

2. A single individual’s eyes can help up to 4-6 people. Different layers of the two corneas and parts of sclerae of the 2 eyes can potentially save the structure and provide sight to upto 6 different people.

3. The procedure takes only 15 minutes. In most instances the entire eye is not removed. Only the cornea which is the outermost part is removed and small guaze balls are placed and the eyelids are closed. There is no damage to the face. Externally it would be difficult to tell that the eyes have been donated.

4. In case of an urgent call for eye donation for our beloved ones, dial 1919 to connect to the nearest eye bank. Eye bank personnel would visit our homes and do the needful within half an hour of reaching our homes.

5. Eyes have to be removed within 6 hours of the death and transplanted to the recipient within 96 hours.

6. India has tremendous shortage of corneas, so everyone must donate their eyes.

B. How can one prevent an eye infection?

One of the commonest reasons for corneal blindness in India is infection.

1. If you feel something is in the eye; DO NOT rub the eye, let it tear and visit an eye surgeon.

2. Do not be your own doctor and do not try over the counter eye drops from a local chemist. Eyes are too precious. Do not neglect them; go see an eye specialist immediately in case of injury to the eyes.

3. Be extremely meticulous while wearing and removing contact lenses. Make sure you do not scratch your eye while removing or inserting the contact lens. DO NOT share contact lenses, clean them regularly with the contact lens solution provided.

C. Tips for people who work long hours in front of computer

1. Take short breaks after every 30 – 40 minutes and look at distance, out of an open window or down a long corridor as far as possible for a minute or two.

2. Remember to blink when you are in front of a computer screen. The blink rate drops from normal of about 18 times per minute, to as low as only thrice every minute. Try to keep your blink rate as close to normal while on computers

Eye numbers in a child depend on two factors – length of the eye and the shape of the cornea. And in a child the eye number will change with age till they stabilize when the growth of the child stabilizes between 18-22 years of age. So don’t scold your child if he/she gets glasses and expect the eye numbers to change as the child grows; till it stabilizes. Having glasses is not really your or your child’s fault.

LASIK surgery to get rid of glasses is advisable only when the numbers stabilize and remain stable for a year.

Finally Dr. Mayur R. Moreker spoke a few minutes on the realization of his passion to be a Martial Arts Student touching upon the innovative concept of training the visually impaired in Martial Arts at Aatish Academy For Performing X-treme Arts, Andheri, Mumbai

I don’t know if this something unique to us Indians or this is a human nature. I haven’t been amongst any other group of people so I can only comment about us Indians.

I find we Indians lack conscience. In our daily life we do so many things without thinking of others.

We Indians go to a mall’s food court and we occupy seats even though we have no intention to eat anything. And we see people around us running from here and there with trays and plates in hand trying to find a chair. Especially young couples and college kids are often found sitting chit chatting and hogging the chairs.

Then there is irresponsible parking. People really don’t think about others while parking their own vehicles. They don’t really think that they are wasting a scarce resource, albeit temporarily.

And then there’s corruption. Corruption is not limited to a government official demanding bribe to perform his duty. Its about anything that goes against the law. We jump signals, we travel without proper tickets, we do not pay proper taxes and when caught we try to bribe our way out.

The builder of the mall where I have my office suddenly blocked the basement parking and started selling it even though it is completely illegal. His defense – everybody does it, so I will also do it. We Indians spit and throw garbage on the roads and when confronted we have the standard answer – “Everybody does it.”

Why? Why does everybody do it? Why people don’t care about others? May be it is in the genes. Jiski lathi uski bhains, survival of the fittest. Is that the mantra?

I know hoping for a fair world is too much. Hoping for people to care for others is just asking of too much off them. A fair world is an utopia possible only in communist manifestos, not in the real world.